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4.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 5 / 21
Higher Education Funding Council
for England (HEFCE)
• In 2009 updated their strategic statement and
action plan – Sustainable Development in HE.
• “Sustainable development principles must lie
at the core of the education system, such that
schools, colleges and universities become
show cases for sustainable development
among the communities that they serve”
Securing the future; delivering the UK’s
sustainable development strategy.

5.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 6 / 21
United Nations (UN)
• 2005-2014 the Decade of Education for
Sustainable Development.
• Goal – to integrate the
principles, values and
practices of sustainable
development into all
aspects of education
and learning.

8.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 9 / 21
“We worked as a team...
this seemed much more
valuable than just
writing an essay or
having a discussion.”
“I was thinking
more about the real
life Psychology
because the avatars
represented real
people with real
psychological
problems.”
“...the content was
easy to access and
the tasks very
enjoyable.”

9.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 10 / 21
Education for Sustainable
Development
• Brundtland Commission: SD is
–“…development that meets the
needs of the present without
compromising the ability of
future generations to meet their
own needs.”
• Education is the means through
which sustainable development can
be achieved. UNESCO

10.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 11 / 21
• Two Sustainability / TEL Projects:
– With Rosemary Horry (Environmental Sciences) funded by the Higher
Education Academy.
– With Zaheer Hussain (Psychology) funded by the Higher Education Academy
Psychology Network.
• Evaluated different methods of embedding ESD in the curriculum.
• Used Second Life to rate people’s pro-environmental behaviour and
attitudes to ‘green’ issues such as recycling, energy use and
resources.
• Participants reported more pro-environmental behaviour a week
after seeing the videos.

11.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 12 / 21
• In the problem-based learning scenarios we used programmed
avatar interactions to lead the students to ask the question of ‘what
is Sustainability?’
• The scenarios had some concrete examples from a contemporary
lifestyle perspective.
• We constructed a series of learning scenarios for staff and students
that highlighted the motivational and behavioural factors that
impact on sustainability (e.g. resources, recycling and energy
efficiency).

12.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 13 / 21
• Scenario 1. Resources: Small
groups of students find out who has
been using the most water in the
virtual household and why, by
interacting with the avatars and each
other.
• Issues such as beliefs and behaviour
about showers vs. bathing, washing
the car and using the dishwasher were
explored along with wider issues of
sustainability of resources.
•
Example project video (3m20s):
http://youtu.be/N_0FNyUX1Uo

13.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 14 / 21
• Scenario 2. Recycling: Students are
tasked to establish what the issues are
with one particular member of the
family who is refusing to engage in pro-
environmental behaviour.
• Issues such as beliefs about recycling
paper, card and metal were explored in
an attempt to find out why they think
recycling is a good idea but
nevertheless fail to engage in these
activities.
Project video (2m26s):
http://youtu.be/i4FOB6Yf_HQ

14.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 15 / 21
• Scenario 3. Energy Efficiency:
Students worked in teams to answer
questions about home energy use (e.g.,
leaving things on standby), replacing light
bulbs with low wattage equivalents,
whether using a microwave is better than
the oven or the energy consumption of a
washing machine at 30°C rather than
40°C. Example project video (2m20s):
http://youtu.be/EusqbduUejg

18.
DMU 2013 Dr Simon Bignell, 3D Virtual Avatars and Machinima to Educate Students about Sustainability. 19 / 21
Best Practices Document
Best Practices in Virtual Worlds Teaching: A guide
to using problem-based learning in Second Life